There may be a plan behind Trump's reckless behavior

Donald Trump is no Adolf Hitler, at least not yet. But I would be alarmed by any American president who would do what he is doing.

He attacked our judicial branch for refusing to approve his unconstitutional immigration ban and, as a further insult to our judiciary, he pardoned the racist forme sheriff Joe Arpaio. He disparaged all 17 of our intelligence agencies, which concluded that Russia did indeed meddle in our 2016 presidential election. He attacks leaders of his own political party in the legislative branch because a few of them, painfully few, have started to call him to account. With his arm twisted behind his back, he belatedly condemned the hate speech of neo-Nazis in Virginia. He’s even attacking the press as the “enemy of the people.”

It has always been said that all you’d have to do is read Hitler’s “Mein Kampf” to know what he would do if he ever came to power. It was a blueprint for what followed. Similarly, maybe we should have paid more attention to Trump’s 1987 book “The Art of the Deal,” in which he says: “The final key to the way I promote is bravado. I play to people’s fantasies. People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those who do. That’s why a little hyperbole never hurts. People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest and the most spectacular.” Am I hearing the voice of Joseph Goebbels here?

The question remaining in my mind is whether he is merely an ignorant buffoon, or, even worse, that there may be a planned and very dangerous strategy behind his reckless behavior.